When do you think the new CEO was made aware of the fact that her new five point strategy is literally the exact same plan the company has supposedly been implementing for at least a decade? I mean, do you think RD had the decency to tell her before yesterday's presentation or did she have to read about it in this mornings business section?
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Out with RD. In with GW. Do it already.
This. This is everything.
My take on the whole M-Go technology connectivity initiative is this: I think the actual, number one, honest to goodness single issue from which all other problems stem from is the fact that the company has established unrealistic and uncompetitive margin requirements for its products. Margins requirements go up, price points stay the same, so of course quality suffers, which in turn makes the product feel cheaper and thus overpriced and so consumers turn to the competition. Sales fall, we lose market share, and in turn margin requirements go up in a desperate attempt to improve the bottom line. A vicious downward spiral.
The idea is that, if we just put some compelling tech into the toys, we wouldn't be competing with other toy companies becuase our products would be more advanced. People would be buying into a ecosystem or an experience, yadda yadda yadda. We could charge more, and people would gladly pay, our margins would be fat and so would our POS, we could finally breakout of the cycle. They see tech as the answer.
Its a risky bet, and the stakes are super high at the moment. So far consumers haven't shown much appetite for really expensive tech toys, but maybe that's because we've yet to crack that nut with a truly compelling must have feature yet. I wonder if it even exists, or if it will become this company's white whale.
Out with RD. In with GW. Do it already.
Was the Wi-Fi Dream House a big hit?
IIRC the Hello Barbie doll was kind of a flop, with plenty of negative press about privacy concerns to boot.
I guess I'm just trying to understand where all of the leadership's confidence in these type of connected tech toys is coming from? They seem to have gone so far as to make them the centerpiece of there recently unveiled turnaround strategy to improve the top line.
I was under the impression that designers were already struggling to include even basic features in toys due to high margin requirements, wouldn't a push for more tech in these product only exacerbate this problem? And especially if consumers haven't shown much interest in them in the past. Am I missing something here?
"I really wish more of my kid's toys could connect to the internet and/or an iPhone," said no parent ever. Hahaha, perfect. But given our awesome track record with high technology and seamless integration with meaningful phygital play experiences, why shouldn't we shove more Apptivities down consumer's throats? Hello Barbie! How's that wifi dreamhouse working out for ya?
The group that has been around and RD the retread need to be moved. They are all unemployable outside of Mattel. That's why they won't leave on their own. The street knows it. The crediblity of Mattel with this team might be the lowest it has ever been.
The previous CEOs been on Mattel's Board of Directors for over 20 years and his turnaround plan failed to launch. What chance does this new CEO stand, especially considering her leadership team are essentially the same folks who've been running the company for the past five to ten years?
Maybe she doesn't know how to Google the past strategies on-line?
"I really wish more of my kid's toys could connect to the internet and/or an iPhone," said no parent ever.
RD tell her? Where do you think she got this stuff? She certainly doesn't have the industry experience to come up with anything herself. She has to get everything from her minions, the ones that have been the problem all along.
Buzzwords don't solve problems.
Fuel Innovation? By hiring a flamboyant pottery maker to run FP design in his spare time?
Improve internal operations? As opposed to external operations? Just say you're going to ship even more jobs overseas in cost cutting attempts. It is clear you can't move the bottom line by moving the top line, so cost cutting is the only thing left.
Improve corporate culture? By keeping the useless in charge, the ones that got us here? What, more ice cream days?
MattHell has failed miserably whenever it has tried to enter into tech, from the Learning Co. to DiaperScan to Craptivties to the creepy interactive Barbie. Whatever they've attempted has always been & will continue to be copy cat/me too and over priced to boot. Everything is over priced in order to pay all the over staffed do nothing upper management
Which group is going come up with the concepts, Toy Box, Games & Puzzles? Give me a break as I'm surprised that group still even exists in the Maple building. They even managed to totally ruin a once very healthy 100mm Latin American Max Steel Line. The VP who was responsible for that debacle is now gone, his Max Steel movie may have opened in Iceland, not kidding either.
Mattel is doomed going forward until it gets sold...........no worries, RD will fix it........not.
Let's hope we know how to spend the $300m dividend money to grow the business and not on boondoggle's to Europe and Cannes like the content team is next week. Those days better be over.
is her email her full name m.go@mattel.com? i'd be willing to send this ding dong an email
While I agree that M-Go's "new" strategy is essentially identical to the previous CEO's turnaround plan (and we all know how well that worked out), however, keep in mind that the CEO Stock-Down was all about building a company that looked beyond the core brands.
In hindsight he didn't do a great job at that, who could forget that Max Steel reboot and live action movie that were the centerpiece of Stock-Down's tenure, but if you recall, back in 2013 Forbes even ran an expose on Stock-Down called "Life After Barbie: Why Mattel Isn't Scared Of iPads And Video Games" in which he was quoted as saying, "We learned that we did better when we applied technology to traditional play patterns. Just being digital is not an end unto itself or a guarantee of success. The core buyer we target remains younger, and for them toy play has remained largely unchanged at about 30 minutes a day, even with the growth of digital."
This quote was in reference to the company's abysmal track record when it comes to tech-infused products. I'm old enough to remember the Learning Company debacle, but you could look back as far as Intellivision in the 70's and track forward to HyperScan, Hello Barbie, Smart Bear, Sproutling etc. and I'm sure dozens of other tech flops in between. Stock-Down understood that weakness, but he's gone now and with the current inexperienced leadership's apparent obsession with "tech for tech's sake", I fear Mattel is doomed to repeat it's past missteps.
Ask him to read layoff dot com
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Create connected play experiences.
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Target emerging markets.
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Fuel innovation.
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Improve internal operations.
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Improve corporate culture.
Real groundbreaking stuff.